WomenNC’s mission is to lead North Carolina’s young adults in the elimination of injustice against women and girls. Our vision is to raise a generation that will honor women’s human rights. This blog follows the experiences of our talented fellows. Enjoy reading about their journeys!

Monday, March 13, 2017

Day 2: The Official First Day

Today was marvelous. I have not felt this marveled since
summer. Today I began my day alongside Beth. We attended a parallel event
titled “Future Shift: Young Women and the Changing World of Work”. The event
was hosted by YWCA Canada. YWCA is a non-profit organization that was
originally focused on eliminating racism. Overtime it has expanded to focus on
women’s issues. Just FYI. Interestingly enough, this event was led by young “millennial”
women.

(Future Shift: Young
Women and the Changing World of Work)

I quoted the term millennial because that’s what they called
themselves. That’s what the media calls us. But this is the first time in my
life that they have embraced our millennial generation. I am so glad I attended
this event. It helped me feel proud to be a millennial woman. At this point you’re
probably wondering why. Well they explained a few issues that our generation of
working women have gone through in the past years and are going through right
now. Issues like online “trolling”, underpaid/ unpaid work, lack of affordable
child care. (Sidenote: North Carolina ranks 11th in most expensive
childcare of all the states). The young female speakers shared their work
history in relation to technology, lack of legislative support, and the
perception of society, and occupational segregation.

Occupational
segregation in terms of vertical and horizontal were discussed in 3 out of the
4 events I attended today. Occupational segregation refers to the tendency for
men and women to seek employment in different jobs
(horizontal segregation). Vertical segregation refers to the way specific
occupations tend to have a lower societal status and less rewarded positions than
others. Nordic leaders explained this concept to me for the first time. I had
no idea that these ideas were defined and heavily researched.

One of the speakers explicitly told the crowd that she was a
millennial and yes people consider us millennial individuals“lazy” but our generation
consists of hard working women that work long hours unpaid in this current economic
structure. The audience clapped after she stated this. I had never really
though much about unpaid work that women do of all kinds such as domestic work.
I had also never realized how under-appreciated
most care-giving jobs are given the undervalued pay. This was discussed at the
side event at the UN Headquarters titled “Gender equality the Nordic
way: What can we learn from it?” Some prime ministers of children in the
Nordic countries mentioned that the care-giving jobs are still far less
underpaid than the jobs in the male dominate field.

(Gender equality the Nordic way: What can we learn from it?)

Even though Nordic countries have balanced employment of
women, the pay gap is still there. One minister mentioned that despite all the
efforts, care-giving jobs (that women tend to take on more than men) are often
viewed as less than compared to the jobs that men take on. The options of
care-giving jobs are so limited compared to non care-giving jobs as the prime
minister mentioned. She gave the example of the nursing profession. While
nursing is seen as a feminine care-giving job, there aren’t as many nursing
type of jobs as engineering jobs which tend to be male dominant. There’s all
kinds of engineering fields for men to enter like industrial, civic, and so
forth but women are less limited to the type of nursing they can engage in. I
had never thought of this. Male-dominant fields are expansive in terms of job
opportunities. Which goes back to emphasizing how BADLY we need more young
girls in the STEM field. I think of the speakers from the first event compared
the pay of the stem field and the social field also. She noted that RIGHT NOW
we need more people involved in the social context than advancing the next
technological thing. (She made reference to politics when she said this).
However because women’s participation in the social field wasn’t valued as
much, they are under-appreciated. I feel like those two sessions really expanded
my view of the life hardworking women go through. I have so much more respect
for women now more than ever. I go to an all women’s college and I already knew
what it felt like to be a woman and step into the shoes of a woman. However, to
step into the career path of a woman emotionally is different. I now believe
that women don’t complain enough about all the work that they have to do. Even some
ambassadors at the UN Ministerial Round Table discussed the unpaid work that
women do. The ambassador of Spain compared the amount of domestic work women
did to the bare minimal hour that men do in his country…which I don’t have much
data for in our country but from experience, my female friends most often
complain about how often men leave dishes around and don’t do laundry. The
little things often end up meaning all too much for women- they cost women too
much. I am going to miss the UN CSW tomorrow now that the blizzard canceled all
of tomorrow’s events.